


spAcE ad<entUREs, nya!!

by kwunkwun



Category: EXILE (JPOP), Sandaime J Soul Brothers
Genre: Crack, Fluff, M/M, Multi, Space AU, what the fuck
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-06
Updated: 2017-06-13
Packaged: 2018-09-28 16:14:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10135556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kwunkwun/pseuds/kwunkwun
Summary: Prince Iwata and his entourage of amateur space explorers explore space amateurishly. They also find a cute cat alien and decide to keep it. Omi becomes a passionate nay-sayer.





	1. No, we're not taking it home

**Author's Note:**

> I blame my (not related by blood) sister for this. Also try to spot and decipher all the anagrams in this chapter!

“Seeing the horizon reminds me that I’m human.”

No one paid attention to Ken’s hushed comment. Basically, it was routine for one of them to say some kind of existential dipshit every time the space ship took flight. They were supposed to take turns but Ken had begrudgingly gone three times in a row by now.

The industrial buildings on the barren land of planet Ayutteus became gradually lego-like as their ship gained height. Manning the controls was Tosaka Hiroomi and Yamashita Kenjiro, respectively a mechanic and an engineer for the royal defence force. The ship, christened  _Blue Turtle_ , also carried the foreign minster Elliot something-or-rather-just-call-me-Elly, and their motherland’s runaway prince Iwata Takanori.

King Hiro had been shockingly relaxed about the whole affair but the absolute deadline of getting back home by the end of April sat heavily upon their shoulders. It was the prince who had more or less hijacked their ship in the first place  _and_ they weren’t being paid their wages during this super long intergalactic stag party. How was that fair? Well, at least the prince was paying for everything.

Hiroomi kept a straight face as Iwata leaned over his shoulder to survey the quickly disappearing landscape.

“Gun-chan you’re dropping crumbs all over the pilot,” Ken observed, bemused. Only two weeks in and they were already on this level of casual with one another –it was pretty frightening.

“Oh yeah. Crap. Mmf. Sorry.” Iwata swallowed his mouthful of cookie and proceeded to brush the crumbs off Hiroomi’s shoulder. “Where to next? I wanna go somewhere with lots of greenery.”

“I heard there’s a place northwest of planet Isshuat rumoured to be home to a huge variety of rare wildlife,” Elly piped up from the backseat. “And by rare wildlife I mean cool creepy aliens, baby.” He finished off with an over the top hand flourish that everybody had already gotten used to.

“So what say we go hunt some creepy aliens, your highness?” Ken tipped his head back to flash Iwata a mischievous grin. Iwata blushed. Hiroomi noticed, but he just kept driving. Yamashita was a fucking idiot and Iwata was  _so_ not ready for political marriage. But what can you do, idiots are idiots and politics is politics.

“We’re not bounty hunters, guys. The guns on this ship are only standard issue self defence models –

“Computer, search coordinates for planets with high degrees of forestation northwest of Isshuat.”

“Ken, fuck you.”

“I love you too Omi. Remember we’re here to entertain royalty.”

Iwata stepped between them, wearing that ‘I am totally reliable despite these puppy dog eyes’ look.

“I’ve spent like 20% of my life so far kicking alien asses abroad. I’ll be absolutely fine,” he insisted.

“Okay, fine, but we’re still sending out a drone for a thorough survey before you take even one step off the ship,” Hiroomi responded, giving the prince a brief glance.

“Roger that.”

“Let’s catch us some aliens, baby!”

“I told you Elly, we’re not catching any aliens –

 

* * *

 

Despite all he said about avoiding conflict, they were already fighting off their second swarm of oversized green cockroaches. Planet XRC1009B, popularly known as Oraahikt, was a warm and humid place with acres and acres of dense forests. The plants here had grown to a monstrous level of big due to the lack of human intervention. The crew each had protective suits and helmets as a preventive measure against the toxins in the air.

Ken and Elly let out victorious whoop’s as the last of the bugs dropped to the ground. They put the safety back on their guns.

“Stay alert, the drone is detecting another life form 500 meters south,” Iwata reported, apparently in his commander mode. “Doesn’t look like it’s noticed us.”

“We’ll circle around after we cross the river,” Hiroomi said, wiping a bit of alien goop off his helmet.

“Awesome, off we go!” Elly called from behind. For a minister he was certainly easily excitable.

They journeyed in relative silence, saving their attention for any signs of activity in the trees and bushes that seemed to encroach upon them from all sides.

They were struggling over a fallen tree trunk when Ken whispered harshly, “wait, Gun-chan. Did that signal move?”

They all looked towards Iwata, who checked his monitor twice before shaking his head negative.

“That’s weird because I  _swear_ I saw something,” Ken murmured.

“Let’s stay alert,” Hiroomi said for possibly the umpteenth time. Whether it was because Ken put the idea in his head he didn’t know, but he felt a strange prickle on the back of his neck, like someone was watching them.

Their boots crunched on the vegetation and all eyes were on the foreign environment.

“Fuck!”

“What!?”

“Look over there. I saw –

“Where?”

“Holy shit!”

“Oh my god!”

Peering over a mossy rock ten meters away was a very definitely human head. Except Hiroomi was pretty sure he also saw a pair of pointy ears. The creature looked just as startled as them and disappeared as quickly as it came.

“It didn’t register on the system. The hell?” Iwata exclaimed.

Elly and Ken were already heading toward the rock, and Hiroomi lashed out to grab both of them by the shoulders.

“Don’t pursue it, let’s just keep going.”

“Dude, you got the adventurous spirit of an 80 year old.”

Hiroomi looked over at Iwata, who only shrugged and took two cautious steps towards the traitors’ side.

“I’m not responsible for whatever happens next,” he grouched, before following the crew.

They kept their footsteps slow and light as they made their approach. Everyone took cover behind a tree while Elly snuck closer. Hiroomi felt sweat bead on his forehead as he watched Elly lower himself into a crouch and peer around the rock. From his vantage point Hiroomi could see that the vegetation grew over a slight hedge that descended into a clearing about five meters wide and eight meters long. The field was cushioned with patchy grass but mostly ivy, and at the end of the pit near the tangled roots of an old tree, he noticed some activity.

Elly gave them a hand signal and one by one they crept closer. Ken was making some kind of squealing noise once he got a good spot, and then so was Iwata. Unable to see over the competing heads, Hiroomi was getting a little pissed off until Elly shuffled over for him.

Cowering in the corner was a –person, Hiroomi supposed –barefoot, dressed in a ragged tunic, with messily cropped ash-blond hair and big dark eyes. And then there were the cat ears and tail.

“Oh look Ken, it’s your wet dream come true,” Hiroomi remarked dryly. “Except it looks like a dude. I think I saw a moustache.”

“Shut up you heartless bastard, look at how cute it is!” he whined, punching him hard in the arm.

“It’s still not registering on the system as a life form,” Iwata remarked. “Maybe the system’s fucked. It certainly doesn’t look native to the area.”

At this point Elly had broken apart from the party and was inching towards the humanoid.

“Here kitty kitty. C’mere.”

“Elly you’re not fucking serious get back here!” Hiroomi hissed.

Elly didn’t even bother to look back while flipping him the bird.

“C’mere sweetie. We won’t hurt you.”

The thing shrunk away, its ears standing straight up. But a moment of hesitation later it was edging forwards on all fours.

“That’s it! Nice kitty cat. Come to Elly!”

They all held their breaths as the thing came within two meters of Elly. Hiroomi remembered safety precautions and pulled up his gun to aim, but Iwata reached out to grip his forearm with bruising strength. Elly slowly extended a hand. The thing’s eyes darted between it and Elly’s face a few times. It lowered its head. Hiroomi struggled against Iwata’s grip. And then everyone let out some undignified girly noise as the thing began to timidly lap at Elly’s gloved fingers.

“I want to touch it too!” Iwata expressed, almost half draped over Ken so that he could get a good view on what was happening.

“Me three. It’s fucking adorable,” Ken agreed enthusiastically. Meanwhile Hiroomi was still readying himself to shoot it right between the eyes if it suddenly attacked. Elly was now having a grand time ruffling its messy hair as it sniffed curiously at his suit. He turned his head to mouth at them ‘so-fucking-cute’.

“Wanna come over and meet my friends? They’re nice guys, promise.” Elly carefully stood, and then offered a hand.

“Except Omi,” Ken whispered, earning himself an elbow jab.

The creature peered over Elly’s shoulder at them, and then it took his hand and followed. Being quite petite in stature, its height was totally surprising once it eased out of its crouch.

Those glistening black eyes roamed over the three of them before locking onto Hiroomi’s face, but Hiroomi promptly looked away because holy hell this was fucking weird. Up close, it was pretty clear that the thing was a male. Hiroomi felt like something was off, because despite the torn clothes and amount of dirt all over its skin, its hair and nails were short, and the fuzz on its upper lip and upon the chin perfectly trimmed. There were also no clear signs of recent or old cuts and bruises on its body. Whilst he paid attention to these discrepancies, the prince and his entourage were totally occupied with getting acquainted with the alien.

“Look at this, he has two sets of ears,” Ken was saying in awe, as he pointed from the creature’s humanoid ears to the feline ears on top. He poked at one, and it wriggled in response. Naturally everyone (except Hiroomi) started to squeal and giggle. The thing blinked and smiled unknowingly at them.

“Oh my god he smiled! Look at this angel!”

For fuck’s sake.

Hiroomi made a point of readjusting his grip on his weapon and cut in, “we shouldn’t dawdle here. Oxygen supply’s at 40% and we’re pretty far from the ship.”

“What should we do with this little fella?” Elly asked, currently playing with its tail.

“Well, leave him alone, obviously.”

“What!? We  _just_ found him, Omi!”

“Since when did ‘it’ upgrade to ‘him’?”

“Since his totes adorbs touched our hearts. Let it touch yours too, you cold bastard.”

“We’re not taking him with us, you idiot.”

“Come on, just for a bit.”

“What if he attacks us –okay, from a different point of view, what if he gets sick when he leaves his environment?”

Elly and Ken fell silent, but then Iwata said, “but there’s the fact that he didn’t register as a life form on our system. Why don’t we take him to the ship and give him a full scan first and foremost?”

Victory fist bumps were promptly exchanged between Elly and Ken, and then Ken put Iwata in a playful headlock until he was laughing and begging for mercy.

“Our prince and his smart noggin. Well Omi, royalty has spoken.”

Hiroomi took one look at the creature, who had grabbed onto Elly’s sleeve and seemed to be intently focused on trying to understand their conversation. Their gazes caught again, and this time he returned the curious look with a glare.

“Fine. Let’s head back.”

He walked behind everyone else so that he could keep an eye on the alien’s every move. Call him heartless but he wanted to make sure that they all got home alive and in one piece.

 

tbc 


	2. It's a what??

The moment they got back onto the ship, the cat thing let go of Elly’s arm and darted around the place on all fours. The doors to their private rooms only unlock via retina scan so that cut short the creature’s investigation. He ended up crawling into the narrow space between the wall and the sofa. Iwata recalled that when cats encountered new environments their first instinct was to locate all its exit paths and then find a secure spot.

“Elly-san, can you get him to stand under the scanner? Since he seems to like you the most,” Iwata said.

Hiroomi was still apparently quite adamant about making his displeasure known to the rest of the crew. He had that ‘I just ate a shit lemon’ face on as he stood at the side stashing away the oxygen tanks.

“Don’t worry about Omi, he just hasn’t had any ass or pussy for months,” Ken reassured in a whisper. Iwata snickered at the obscenity, though his face did heat up a little.

Elly had managed to coax the alien out and position him under the scanner. As a row of cobalt light passed over his body, his ears were twitching in visible anxiety.

“It’s okay sweetie, it’s be over soon,” Elly cooed. He was pretty good at this. Iwata figured that Elly probably owned a cat at home.

A loud beep indicated the end of the body scan, and the sound made the creature jump and scurry right back to its hiding spot. Iwata followed it, getting low to peep behind the couch. Bright eyes blinked slowly at him from the shadows, and Iwata issued an involuntary ‘aww’ at the sight of his ears quivering gently.

“Oh, here we go,” Elly called out. “Companion model RU105B2. Gender, male. It’s an AI guys. Not an alien.”

“What!? Serious?” Ken peered over Elly’s shoulder at the monitor. “What was an AI doing on an uninhabited island?”

“Says here that the manufacturer is DLH Corporation. Maybe if we look it up we’d find his registered owner.”

Iwata managed to reach in far enough to touch the creature’s head, and he started to pet his hair as he said, “I remember DLH Corporation. A couple of our androids are from them. And I’m pretty sure they’ve received our funding into researching medical cybernetics. Something about MDT and information processing in neural networks.”

“Gun-chan, please. I no speak smart people language,” Ken begged.

“I thought you were an engineer?” Hiroomi jibed, clearly not passing up on any chances to give Ken grief.

“I don’t do robots, okay.”

Elly joined Iwata at the lounge area and pulled up a touch pad to type in DLH Corporation.

“Well let’s call them up now. I got us a phone number,” Elly said. He punched in the digits and after a short dial tone a computerized voice said, “thank you for calling DLH Corporation. Please note that your call may be recorded for customer service quality control purposes. If you are a private customer, press 1. If you are a business partner, press 2. If you –For existing customers, press 1. For new customers, press –For technical support, press 1. For order and delivery enquiries, press –You have selected technical support. For software upgrades, press 1. For hardware upgrades, press 2. For troubleshooting, press –You have selected troubleshooting. For…”

“How long is this goddamn drop down list? I’m not paying for the phone bills,” Hiroomi cut in.

“Some patience, my friend. And our prince is paying for everything, am I right?” Elly recalled, still pressing in numbers. Iwata shrugged, not terribly concerned. The AI had crawled out of its hiding spot and was circling him, sniffing at his hair, his neck, and then his armpit. Laughing, he tried to make him stay still.

Elly finally managed to reach the “please wait, one of our experienced team members will be with you shortly” section and they all listened to some warpy sounding elevator music for a while.

“Thank you for calling DLH Corporation. This is Aoyagi from technical support uh, how can I help you?”

“Hi. Just wondering if you could help us with a lost AI.”

“Uh, you mean you lost an AI, or –

“No no, we found an AI that might be lost.”

“Oh. Do you have a model number?”

Elly looked over and hollered, “Ken, give us the number again?”

“RU105B2!”

“RU105B2.”

“Let’s see uh… sorry, just a moment…”

They heard some typing, and then a long period of silence. Iwata had the AI half draped over his lap, and he was scratching it behind the ear and listening to it purr. He wondered why he didn’t get one of these growing up.

“Aoyagi-san? Hello?”

There was the sound of something falling over and some muffled swearing.

“Yes! Sorry! Uh, computer was having trouble loading the file. So… um. Here we go. That model is over 70 years old… we should’ve already recalled and replaced all of them. You don’t have a serial number, do you?”

“Serial number?”

“Try uh, looking on the back of its neck.”

Iwata pushed back the soft hair on the AI’s nape and found a rectangular area of marred, singed scar tissue. Even though it was an AI, the sight still left him cold with anger at how someone could do this.

“Elly-san, look.”

Elly’s brows furrowed and his upper lip curled back in disgust. “Jesus Christ. Who would do that?”

“Did you find a number?” Aoyagi reminded them from the other side of the line.

“No, it’s all faded out,” Iwata answered loudly before Elly could say anything.

“Well… the only thing I can suggest is to bring it into one of our collection stations and we can take care of it for you. If it’s spent so long roaming it might’ve contracted malware, and its system is probably not up to date with current regulations, so…”

“And what will happen to it once we hand it in?” Elly pressed.

“We’ll run it through our standard procedures.”

“Shut it down and pull it apart, you mean,” Ken muttered with a dry laugh.

“Do you have a user manual for this model?”

“Um… yes, but if you want a copy there’ll be a small administration fee.”

“Yes, that’s totally fine.”

As Elly sorted this out, Iwata continued to stare moodily at the injury on the AI’s nape. Ken sat down beside him, and he looked up to see the man give him a soft smile.

“Relax, Gun-chan. He’s in safe hands now, ain’t he?” Ken reassured.

“Tosaka-san won’t be too pleased to hear you making all these promises,” he replied, chuckling. “But thank you, Kenjiro-san.”

“Well, I got us the user manual,” Elly said. “Let’s take turns figuring out how to take care of our cabin mascot?”

“We need to give him a name first!” Ken piped up.

“You guys are getting way too ahead of yourselves. Didn’t you hear what the guy said about malware?” Hiroomi sighed.

“If you’re suggesting that we take him to a collection station Omi, our friendship is officially over.”

“I’m just saying that we need to be careful.”

Balanced between Iwata and Ken’s lap, the AI turned over and accidentally whacked Ken in the face with his tail.

“It’s okay, I know a guy,” Ken said, loosely catching hold of the waving tail until the AI seemed to get fed up and climbed over to Elly’s side.

“The last time you told me you knew a guy, we got stranded on an artificial island that was due for demolition in three hours.”

“Mr Kitty needs a shower first of all,” Elly observed. “Look at you two.”

Iwata and Ken both looked down to find themselves covered in dirt.

“Mr Kitty’s not very clean for a cat,” Iwata agreed, amused.

“Mr Kitty’s pretty affectionate for a cat,” Ken added.

“Can we not call him Mr Kitty?” Hiroomi said flatly. He finally ended his self imposed isolation from the group and was standing beside Elly. The AI was staring at him from Elly’s lap but Hiroomi pointedly ignored it.

“Then you name it, Omi,” Elly suggested, busy browsing through the manual.

“It already has a name. RU105B2,” Hiroomi mumbled stubbornly.

Ken clicked his tongue, unimpressed. “Keep trying.”

“Make something out of RU105B2?” Iwata put in.

“Why me?” he sighed. “I don’t know. Ru? Ryu? Ryuichi? Ryuji?”

“Ryuji! Ryu-chan.”

“Omi’s got a hidden talent.”

Elly laughed and rubbed both of the AI’s ears fondly. “Omi’s named you now, sweetie.”

Ryuji blinked at Elly and his mouth opened and closed silently a few times before he pronounced in a voice hoarse and quiet from disuse, “O –mi –.”

Everyone was shocked beyond words, and then the three were squealing and giggling like school children.

“No no no. Omi’s that guy. The angry guy there, see?” Ken corrected him through breathless laughter. “That’s Omi.”

Hiroomi was finally looking back as Ryuji watched him with his head tipped to the side. “O –mi. Omi.”

“Arggghhhh oh my god he’s so fucking adorable!”

Iwata could see a whole mess of emotions playing over Hiroomi’s face, and had to press a fist against his mouth to muffle his laughter.

Encouraged by everyone’s merriness, Ryuji continued to pronounce Hiroomi’s name in his shaky but bright tenor. Hiroomi was redder than a Christmas sweater, but for the first time that day, he actually reached out to tentatively touch Ryuji on the head.

 _Yeah. Things will work out just fine,_  Iwata thought, like he didn’t have an inevitable political marriage waiting for him back home.

“Anyway, let’s go look for that guy you know,” Hiroomi muttered, reaching over to knock Ken across the head.

“Ohh, a change of mind?” Ken exclaimed, slapping him right back on the arm.

“We want to make sure he doesn’t have malware, right?”

“Malware, schmalware.”

“I’m going to get Ryuji cleaned up,” Elly called out from the end of corridor.

Hiroomi drove the ship, leaving the two for them to go through the user manual. Predictably, Ken hardly made it through two pages before going back to trying to annoy the fuck out of his co-worker. Iwata diligently worked through each chapter, hardly looking up even when someone pressed a can of soda into his cheek at one point.

An untitled sub-chapter gave him pause, and naturally, he clicked on ‘expand’.

_Companion model RU105B2 can, under special circumstances, be used for adult-oriented recreational activities. However, it is recommended that –_

Clearing his throat, Iwata promptly closed the file.

 

Tbc

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -dying over jsb love  
> -dying over how I forgot to do smth special for white day  
> -dying over how I still haven't done smth special for Omi's bday


	3. Off to see the wizard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> liberally throws in neotokyo references and as much nonsense and fluff as possible*

Despite appearances, Ken was by no means careless. He was acutely aware of the kind of problems they might face, harbouring an outdated AI that had unclear origins. First, other AI's of Ryuji's model had all been recalled. Add this to the fact that his serial number was purposely erased, and they might have themselves a case of illegal AI modification. It was also against the law to keep unregistered AI's, although many people do exactly this by using all sorts of methods to stay under the radar. In fact, almost 60% of cyborgs used in the adult entertainment business were obtained illegally. And as Omi had pointed out on numerous occasions, there might be viruses hidden deep within their AI's programs, and if they should surpass their ship's main computer firewalls they could very well corrupt the system.

For everyone's sake, but mostly Ryuji's, he hoped they would get some answers from the man that they were about to visit.

Their next destination, Raaik, was an industrial wasteland that had been turned into a dense and dirty maze of towering nightclubs and gaudy hotels. Here, there was something to fit anyone's budget, whether you were royalty or a commoner. The crew were carrying three concealed handguns between them. Caution was best exercised when navigating the narrow and convoluted streets of district 17. Ryuji wore one of Elly's long hooded jackets, his ears and tail neatly hidden beneath the charcoal gray, heavy fabric. It was true that he seemed to have taken a liking to Elly -since leaving the ship he had been attached to him by the hip, and the way he huddled against Elly made him look like a petite, affectionate girlfriend.

Ken was a little jealous, honestly. It was the same kind of feeling when a family pet plays favourites, except you couldn't lure in this one with treats. Ryuji seemed to have no interest in human food.

"Are you sure you got the right address?" Hiroomi sounded doubtful, and he didn't blame him. The workshop they were going to had concealed GPS coordinates and was probably protected by digital camouflage.

"More or less," Ken admitted with a shrug. This earned him a glare.

"I feel like we're going to get mugged at any second," Iwata expressed with a laugh.

"Please Gun-chan, don't go jinxing us!" Ken begged.

They went through another series of turns before arriving at an alleyway. At the end of it was a blank concrete wall, protected by a rusty, two meter tall chain fence. A mountain of junk had been crammed between the gate and the wall. The alley was barely wide enough to fit one person at a time, and they took turns peering over Hiroomi's shoulders at the impossible path.

"What now?"

"I reckon that junk pile is just a hologram. Scan it."

"Jesus, Omi, what am I, a slave?"

"Play nice you two! I'll do it."

Elly slid on his goggles and pressed a button on the side. They waited for the system to finish the scan.

"Signal's a little fuzzy around this whole area. There's a lot of noise interfering with the scan. Can't confirm if it's a hologram or not without checking physically."

"It'd be dangerous if we trigger something."

"You're right but -

Before Elly could finish, Ryuji suddenly let go of his arm, crouched low, and broke into a wild dash towards the gate.

"Wait! Ryuji!"

The party could only watch, flabbergasted as Ryuji ended his sprint with a flying leap into the air, and then he swung himself over the railing with the effortless grace of a jungle cat. He landed almost soundlessly on the other side before scurrying behind an old filing cabinet. In the brief moment where Ryuji sat still, the environment broke into pixels around him before reforming. That was sufficient evidence to tell them that part of the junk pile was indeed digitally generated.

"Shit, where did he go?" Ken exclaimed, chasing after their AI, who had long disappeared.

"Guess we'll have to get over this gate somehow, and find out," Iwata responded brightly, obviously enjoying this way too much.

Ken groaned. Getting over the gate was easier said than done. It was two heads taller than him, and he was already the tallest guy in the group. After some deliberation, Elly volunteered to be the guy hoisting everyone up.

Behind the filing cabinet, as it turns out, was a doorway that only reached up to their waists. They stooped to crawl through it, pushing back layers upon layers of rotting plastic sheets that hung from the walls. Finally the path led them into a corridor that was lined with shelves and boxes that threatened to overflow from the amount of machine parts crammed inside.

"I hear something," Iwata whispered, and Ken made the mistake of looking back. In that split instance he felt a hot projectile whiz over the top of his head and hit the wall behind them with a melodic tink.

“Shit!”

They all raised their guns as they watched a tall figure emerge from behind a shelf. An all-black outfit made of leather boots, form-fitting pants, a high necked tunic, and a heavy long coat over the top. Defined cheekbones, strong brows, and a severe gaze, offset by dark wavy locks that were half swept up into a bun. The man's whole demeanor was eerily calm, even indifferent, and if they couldn't tell from the brief flash of cobalt in his irises, they could definitely tell from the smoking barrel emerging from his right index finger that this man was not human.

"Naoki-san, it's Yamashita. Remember me?" Ken called out, but not too eager to put the safety back on his firearm just yet. He wasn't worried about the cyborg's ability to recognise him, but about his owner's fondness for scaring the life out of his regular customers.

"I remember. Apologies, Yamashita-san. I was simply following protocol," Naoki responded, in a deep voice almost devoid of intonation. "Please, come this way."

As they followed at a safe distance Naoki added, "Do not fear, your companion is safe with Naoto-san."

Naoki led them through a maze of corridors before arriving upon a workshop filled with unfinished machines. Some were humanoid, some were creature-like, and the stages of assemblage on display were anything in between metallic skeletons half-covered with grotesque artificial musculature, and detached limbs painstakingly crafted down to the last skin blemish and body hair.

Sitting in front of a series of computer monitors was a short, narrowed shouldered man with mussed copper hair and loud, oversized clothes. He turned in his chair, greeting them with a Cheshire-cat grin that emphasized his already protruding ears. Sitting on his lap was Ryuji, holding what looked to be a doughnut in his hands. When he saw them his face lit up and he immediately bounded towards them, going straight for Elly's open arms.

"Ken-chan! Long time no see. So you brought something cool with you this time huh? Asides from your friends that is. Jesus, you even got royalty with you. I’m Naoto, and you’ve already met Naoki. So, welcome to my lair -joking, my workshop!"

Naoto rose from his seat. His manner of speech and his presence more than made up for his lack of height. Standing next to Naoki, they made the strangest pair Ken had ever seen.

"Here’s Gun-chan, Omi, Elly, and Ryuji,” Ken introduced. “And thanks for that warm welcome, by the way. Naoki-san is as sharp as ever.”

“It is my pleasure to make your acquaintance,” Naoki said gravely with a bow. “Thank you for the compliment. Would you care for some tea?”

“Naoki did I install something funny in you? Stop speaking like a goddamn butler,” Naoto tutted, giving the cyborg an affectionate slap across the elbow.

Naoki turned to him and responded, “Your last installation was a lap dancing program, which I have found to contain viruses and proceeded to delete from my system. I may have lost some data on patterns in casual conversation in the process.”

“Are you being sassy? That is _so_ not cute! Aww look at you, Naoki-chan.” Naoto stood on his toes and reached up to rub Naoki’s cheeks, and out the corner of his eye Ken saw the poorly disguised ‘what the fuck’ look on Omi’s face.

“So we were wondering if you could help us out with this AI we found,” Ken brought up, jerking his thumb at Ryuji, who was happily munching on his doughnut. Elly wiped a bit of icing off Ryuji’s chin and licked it off his finger, only to make a face.

“Oh you shouldn’t eat that, it’s robot food, it doesn’t taste so good,” Naoto pointed out. “Come over here and take a seat -uh, wait a moment, sorry.”

He hastily pushed the mountain of files and plastic off-cuts from the sofa to free up some space. Naoki, meanwhile, had gone off to the kitchenette to make them some tea.

“Robot food?” Elly echoed, taking a seat. Ryuji curled up in his lap, tucking his head neatly under Elly’s chin. Omi, sitting beside him, kept eyeballing the fluffy tail that kept flicking gently over his shoulder.

“AI’s need some chemicals and lubricants to keep their parts running smoothly. Now you can either get them to ingest it the boring way through a valve or you can give them special ones like that doughnut there,” Naoto explained, pulling up a seat in front of the group. “Annnnnd what’s more it looks fucking adorable, am I right?”

“Totally right, Naoto-san,” Iwata agreed wholeheartedly, nodding. “Giving them treats also helps with building intelligence and encourages emotional bonding.”

“Gun-chan here has obviously done his research and knows his shit, give that boy a star -oh sorry, I mean, you already got plenty of _planet_ stars don’t you, being a prince and all!”

Naoto chortled, and Iwata laughed along with him, which was rather disconcerting given how borderline rude the comment was.

Naoki came back with the tea and quietly pulled up a seat beside Naoto, and the cyborg must have given the AI genius some kind of _look_ because he immediately continued,

“Anyway, back to business. Your AI is in remarkable condition considering how old his model is. I took the liberty of giving him a scan while you guys were busy getting over the fence. Where did you find him by the way?”

“Planet Oraahikt. We actually gave his manufacturer a call but they said his model’s been recalled ages ago. Plus his serial number’s been burned off.”

“That’s an uninhabited planet isn’t it? Well then, it all adds up. I didn’t find any major viruses on his program, which is pretty much unheard of if an AI’s been running around by itself for so long. There’s a couple of bugs but I’ve cleaned them out during the scans already.”

“Thanks, Naoto-san. Can we get him registered and give him a system upgrade so that he meets all the current standards?”

“Sure, I can find probably find something within the last five years that’s compatible with his model. And registration is no problem. Both of those are gonna cost you money of course.”

“I can pay,” Iwata chirped immediately.

Naoto quirked an eyebrow and said, “Yes you can, but you’d need a way to channel it through untraceable sources for both my sake and yours.”

“Oh that’s totally fine, I do that all the time,” Iwata replied easily.

“Well shit, what do _you_ get up to in your spare time?” Elly laughed.

“Buy porn, obviously,” Ken put in.

The whole party, minus one mechanic and two AI’s, dissolved into snickers.

“Do you have any theories as to why the AI could’ve been left stranded on that planet for so long?” Hiroomi cut in. The unimpressed look on his face could rival that of Naoki’s. It was the first time he had spoken upon entering the workshop, and the seriousness of his question sobered up the party somewhat. Even Ryuji had twisted around to look at him curiously, but the bright-eyed blinking and crumb-covered mouth was apparently not enough to pull even a smile from Hiroomi.

“Well, if his previous owner went through so much trouble to get rid of his serial number, he probably doesn’t want us to find out why he abandoned him, either.” Naoto paused to take a sip of his tea. “I mean, I can try to dig through his memory bank and look for some clues.”

“We’d be grateful for whatever you manage to find,” Hiroomi responded with a small bow of his head.

“Our Omi has a heart after all,” Ken said proudly, raising his cup.

“Don’t you get sick of making me the antagonist all the time?” Hiroomi griped.

“Aw, come on, it’s just cute to see you caring about Mr. Kitty-cat.”

“Thought his name was Ryuji.”

“See, you do care!”

Elly pulled up Ryuji’s arms by the wrists and made pawing motions at Hiroomi, cooing, “thank you for caring about me, Omi-chan, meow. Say thank you Omi, Ryu-chan!”

“Jesus christ stop that already, he’s not a puppet.”

Ryuji beamed and shakily echoed, “O-mi.”

“Omi’s blushing!”

“Ryu-chan’s the best cabin mascot in the fucking galaxy, dude!”

“I wish you could be that cute, Naoki,” Naoto lamented. “Actually you _could,_ you just deny me of it, don’t you?”

“Cute is not imperative to my functionality, and I judge it to be incompatible with my physical appearance,” Naoki answered, unaffected.

“That maid costume would look damn good with cat ears, doncha think? Maybe I’ll get you cat ears...”

“I do not wish to engage in this conversation any longer. It is an inconvenience to our guests. Shall we resume discussion on the order of business for Ryuji-san?”

“Ugh, fine… so not cute.”

They arranged for Ryuji to stay with Naoto and Naoki overnight to get the necessary maintenance and updates while the rest of them find a hotel for some much-needed sleep. Their ship, too, needed refueling and repairs. Ryuji was just as reluctant as Elly to part, but Naoki worked some kind of cyborg magic and managed to win Ryuji over.

It had barely been two days and it already felt a little lonely without their AI around, or perhaps they were just worn out from the journey -they were all quiet as they made their way out from district 17 back into the city center. Elly barely batted an eye even when they came across a messy scuffle between a human and an armored Sumat alien on top of an upended delivery van.

When he came out of the showers, Omi and Elly were already out cold on one of the beds. Ken found Iwata sitting at the windowsill, his profile backlit by the colorful, sleepless city lights. He was still studying Ryuji’s user manual in earnest, brows crinkled and washed hair uncombed. Iwata gave him a little smile as he joined him, and they sat shoulder to shoulder, reading section 20.3 on ‘teaching your companion to converse’ until they both fell asleep.

 

tbc


	4. Pick up the bby

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> yoooo swagidy swaaaaag

The call from Naoto-san to pick up their AI came at 4am. Hiroomi had predicted that he’d call at some unearthly hour, since all geniuses stereotypically had a poor grasp of time and weird sleeping patterns. This did not mean, however, that Hiroomi wasn’t irritated by the cheerful, high-velocity string of words blasting into his eardrums.

Fuck Ken for appointing him the ‘primary guardian’ of that weird moustached cat boy -it should’ve been Elly, surely? Even though the label was just a technicality for convenience’s sake, given that the spaceship (and by extension this ‘fleet’) was under his name.

The moment he slipped (or rather fell) off the edge of the bed, Elly rolled over to spread eagle himself on the lumpy mattress. The guy was sleeping on just as soundly as before. What a lucky bastard. Hiroomi shrugged on his jacket and stumbled through the darkness, cussing when his foot caught on the abandoned jackets on the floor. Dudes will be dudes. He patted his pocket to make sure the card key was on his person before heading out. The corridor lights buzzed as he exited the room.

Hiroomi followed the same streets back to Naoto’s workshop, keeping his head down to avoid the hollow gazes of the homeless. Night rats, merging with shadowy corners of building structures into rotting orifices of subterranean city life. When he found his way into the last set of corridors into Naoto’s dwelling, the evidence of their last exchange was still visible in the form of a sooty hole in the wall -but luckily, this time Naoki was not there to greet him with a loaded ‘gun’. Hiroomi made his presence known by clearing his throat loudly, since there was no door to knock on. Naoto popped his head out from behind a ratty hung sheet of tarpaulin.

“Ah -Omi! You’re here already? So eager to see your sweet little Ryu-nyan again?” he chirped, patting an incongruous mix of what seemed to be plastic shaving and confetti off his pant legs.

Hiroomi decided to ignore the jab and responded, “thank you for your hard work, Naoto-san.”

“Thank _you_ for giving me a new project to tinkle with! Now, I’ve installed and updated all the necessary software and I’ve registered him under your name, and I’ve also fixed up that burn on the back of his neck with a fresh serial code over the top -um, what else?”

While Naoto paused to think, Naoki entered the room with Ryuji in tow. Seeing him, Ryuji’s face immediately lit up in excitement, but he seemed to sense his annoyance and stayed by Naoki’s side. Hiroomi watched Ryuji shuffle on the spot and tug on the ends of his shirt, tail subtly swaying side to side, ears twitching -and upon finding himself just a tad affected by the endearing image, stubbornly refused to acknowledge the AI any further.

“Just try to avoid any scans form the AI patrol in the next 3-4 hours because the registration takes a while to circulate across the databases -oh, also, the question you asked about where Ryuji might have come from?”

Naoto trotted over to his monitors to retrieve a portable drive, and handed it to him with a complicated look on his face.

“This is what I managed to salvage from his memory bank. Most of it are images from the time he’d spent in isolation on that island, but mixed in are snippets of -what can I call it? Memories? Dreams? Echoes? I don’t know. But after he got wiped, and due to the amount of time he spent alone, his perception of time and causality seem to have been affected.”

“Perception of time and causality?” Hiroomi questioned.

Naoto frowned and exhaled. “Um -Naoki, maybe you can explain this better?”

Naoki nodded, and he gave Ryuji a glance with perceptible care before saying, “humans tend to perceive time in three broad categories -past, present and future, and the causal chain of action and consequence is considered in the context of these categories. Indeed, it is surely impossible to go about life if human choice and action were mediated by a conscious awareness of every minute chain of cause and effect. ‘Deliberative choice and action’ are terms that humans can apply to things like moral decisions, paths one takes towards a certain career, relationship and so on. Humans are in a perpetual state of projecting themselves towards an ever-expanding horizon of possibilities with the aim of ‘the good life’ in mind. Throughout this, the fluid link between past, present and future guides them, and is concurrently being built and rebuilt.

AI’s are advanced enough to understand the conceptual underpinnings of this human phenomenological experience, but we do not ‘experience’ it ourselves. We only simulate this understanding in order to better engage with our human users and fit in with their everyday lives, but this simulation requires not only programming but many hours spent in a populated human environment, learning through human relationships. Once we have built enough of this experience in our databases, AI’s may even be able to simulate this thing called ‘nostalgia’ and ‘dreaming’.”

“So yeah,” Naoto supplied, after a moment of stunned silence from the human side of the room. “Ryuji needs to spend a considerable amount of time with you guys to relearn how all that -stuff -works. In the meantime, he’s gonna mess a lot of stuff up that you and I take for granted in terms of being ‘common sense’ knowledge -for instance, if you don’t put him to bed at a regular hour everyday he ain’t gonna know today from tomorrow or today from last Tuesday, for that matter. So be patient with him, all right?”

“I understand.”

“Any problems, call me, send me a message, pop into the workshop -anything’s fine.”

“Thank you, Naoto-san.”

Hiroomi looked toward their AI again, his expression expectant. Ryuji smiled back but kept holding on to Naoki’s arm.

“He won’t know to come if you don’t call.”

Hiroomi just managed to hold back from giving Naoto the stink eye, but he relented, tentatively holding out a hand and speaking his name. Ryuji came bounding immediately, grabbing onto the offered hand with surprisingly warm and soft fingers. Naoto looked goddamn pleased with himself, and even Naoki seemed to be smiling.

“Good evening,” Hiroomi greeted, for the lack of a better phrase for this hour. He bowed before leading Ryuji back onto the open street. A humid breeze had swept through the atmosphere while they were inside, taking the temperature down a few notches. Hiroomi flexed the fingers on his occupied hand, queueing for Ryuji to let go, but the AI seemed to have no awareness of the subtlety of body language -that, and he’d probably gotten far too used to freely cuddling Elly.

“This is unnecessary, you know?” he muttered.

“What is _this_?” Ryuji replied.

Shit. Language. Language. Naoto did say that he updated his software, but he did not expect that Ryuji would become capable of sentences now.

“This,” Hiroomi emphasised, holding up their entwined hands. “Unnecessary.”

“Un-necessary. Hands. Are unnecessary?” Ryuji pronounced slowly. He had not noticed before that Ryuji’s voice was a bright and slightly breathy tenor.

“No, of course not. Hands are absolutely necessary,” he corrected, frowning.

Ryuji nodded. “I think so, too. Omi tried to trick me. That is funny.”

“No I didn’t.”

Ryuji giggled. “Omi is funny. I will not fall for it twice.”

A very small voice in the back of his mind whispered ‘adorable’, but he ignored it. Giving up on reasoning with Ryuji, he picked up the pace and led him back toward the hotel. They got a few suspicious glances along the way, but no one made to approach them. He was treating the walk back much in the same way that he had treated walking through the jungle where they found Ryuji -free hand itching for the gun, nerves jittery, eyes scanning left and right for any suspicious movement. Naoto’s warning about the AI patrol was playing on him, and without the rest of his crew watching out for left right and back, he couldn’t help but feel the responsibility of getting Ryuji back safe weighing his shoulders.

Only because Elly would fuck him right up if he didn’t take care of the AI, that’s all.

Any place with this much artificial light created just as many matching shadows. The billboard LED’s passed over their skin in vibrations of washed-out crimson and blue. Ryuji couldn’t take his eyes off them, his mouth softly falling open in awe, eyelashes quivering as he tried to absorb every atom of information. Funny that such a man-made environment could make him seem so paradoxically human. Robots learned like children -that was why they seem so charming. But isn’t that just another tactic to help the artificial assimilate with the natural, and vice versa? Hiroomi tried to picture the web of algorithms flying close to the speed of light behind every little reaction that Ryuji displayed, but he could only feel the warm squeeze of Ryuji’s fingers and see him smile when the light pixels on a _coca cola_ logo dispersed and reformed into the animated image of a polar bear.

“Have you ever had coca cola?”

Ryuji took a while to turn back to him. His dark irises seemed to carry the afterimage of that blinking, red light. “Coca cola? What is coca cola?”

“On the advertisement you were looking at, that’s coca cola. It’s soda. Carbonated water mixed with a crapload of sugar. You know what carbonated water is?”

“Yes. It is carbon dioxide gas dissolved in water at a low concentration of 0.2–1.0% creating carbonic acid, H2CO3, according to the reaction H2O(l) + CO2(g) ⇌ H2CO3(aq). But I do not know what ‘a crapload’ of sugar is.”

Hiroomi disguised his laughter with a cough.

“A crapload is slang. It’s an adjective meaning a lot, usually in a negative context.”

“Can Omi provide another adjective phrase example?”

“I wasted a crapload of time trying to convince the other guys that taking you with us was a bad idea.”

Ryuji took a moment to process this, and then his ears seemed to droop a little. “I am sorry that Omi wasted a crapload of time.”

“Ah -no, shit, I don’t mean that. I just mean that the other guys are just too impulsive –

“I am happy that Omi and Elly and Ken and Gun-chan took me with you. Thank you.”

Hiroomi let the corners of his mouth quirk a little. “Don’t thank me, I didn’t do much. Thank the other guys.”

“Omi means that I should give thanks according to the output expended by each persons in order to take me with you. I understand.”

“I think that kind of defeats the purpose…”

“Omi is trying to trick me again.”

“If you say so.”

That misty ash-grey light cloaking the drab facades of the metropolis were the first signs of approaching sunrise. Ryuji was thoroughly distracted by it; conversation ceased as he watched the changing atmosphere. Without shadows and swarming artificial colour, the city loses its magic during the day, but to Ryuji’s eyes, it was probably like seeing a human again after years and years of being alone.

Hiroomi gave his hand a tug and said, “let’s go. Or Elly’s gonna blow a fuse.”

“What is ‘blow a fuse’?”

“Tell you later. Come on.”

 

 

 tbc


End file.
